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Future Potential WvW-centric Balance Changes - September 13th 2019


Irenio CalmonHuang.2048

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So i don't know where to report it, so I'm just gonna post here and hope balance team see it and fix it.

Renegade elite skill Soulcleave's Summit no longer give out fire field combo since the last update on this skill. Don't know if its intended that you wanted to remove fire field for balance purpose but forgot to include in patch notes but current tooltip still includes fire field.

I do hope it still provide fire field though.

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While I know in the past the devs have wanted to stay away from making skills unique per gamemode, I do believe that having 10-man skills is not a good idea in WvW, especially when it is only some skills that work this way.

While I understand the need for 10 man skills in PvE, 10 man skills in WvW create a lot of unneeded boons/damage/healing when most groups run in parties of five. (Also creating issues between party and squad composition such as 10 man stab but only 5 man cleanses)

Part of the reason many WvWers love the gamemode so much is the synergy needed between classes to get things right when zerging. Many of us miss blasting fire and water fields, believe it or not! I believe removing 10 man skills will help bring back the synergy between classes that many of us miss so deeply!

Thanks!

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@Atros.9607 said:While I appreciate the changes to scourge in both shade placement and fixing the target cap to a more standard variation, I believe the corruption potential of the class is still open for discussion. The firebrand/scourge meta came to be due to the amount of power both classes have in close quarters, and this change feels like we are giving more to scourge and taking away from firebrands. Admittedly the corruption cap has gone down with a single shade per scourge, I can possibly see more gearing into healing and an extra scourge running per subgroup with no actual change to the meta.

Actually the corruption the necro (or any class for that matter overall) isn't even remotely close to the boons being spat out in general. It seem to be widely agreed that there is a massive power creep at the moment. The reason this exists is because the amount of boons being spat out in battle is completely overbearing. Many people will agree there simply is too many boons being doled out by classes at a too high a rate. We've seen people mention this many many times... So what do we see in these changes as an example?

Devouring Darkness is having it's boon corrupting potential from 3 to 2 (even despite many players telling Anet boon potential is too high). They do this, but somehow leave the firebrand with their ability to convert 5 conditions to boons on 5 people with a cooldown not much longer than Devouring Darkness. To make matters worse, this skill basically functions like an elite skill with a tiny cool down. For whatever reason, Anet doesn't touch this skill, but alters Devouring Darkness, even though the players have told Anet repeatedly boon potential is way too high.

This change is taking far more away from Scourge than it is from Firebrands. The very reason the meta is stale is because the Guardian class overall simply does too much. They are basically a master of nearly all trades. While it's nice to have a cap of 10 targets for a shade, in the end it doesn't matter if the shade does abysmal damage, which is exactly what it does on it's own. It's like being hit by a regular arrowcart. Sure it hits 50 targets, but if the average damage is 300-600, it doesn't mean anything.

The boon potential either needs to be drastically lowered in WvW or the corruption abilities need to skyrocket for all classes. Even if all necro marks converted 5 boons to conditions, the boon potential is still going to far outweigh the corruption.

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Yeah 10 man skills have no place in wvw. It's bad enough shade skills are all instant cast and available to the scourge at all times. The other two necro specs have the profession mechanic gated by a transform cooldown. To keep gameplay more interesting, a nerf to the convenience of shades might be more appropriate than hammering the numbers over and over.

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So for all those who say necro buff I say : yes and no, why?Yes, you will be able to bomb 10 targets very easily (if the increase of the radius always remains on sand Savant)But next to that, if you put down your shade you lose all your F2, 3, 4 and 5 for 15 seconds!(because your squad will not be in your shade and the enemies will be gone, and this requires 3 conditions: position of the shade, life force and your CD)You can no longer support your group around you, dispell, put barriers to your group, nor convert.You lose all the support and defense, for your group and for yourself! (it will be much easier to go hand-to-hand for yours ennemies!)


@"Irenio CalmonHuang.2048"

I have some questions about the Shades and Sand savant, I don't find it very clear especially that it involves all game modes!

    1. I didn't really understand, there are no more 3 shades? it's now only single shade with an increase in radius over the entire spe?(if so, it would make the other major features more interesting to take in the different game modes)
    1. Or on sand savant, there is no longer a single big shade, and it is the 3 small ones with 180 radius (ridiculous) who can hit 10 targets?(here it would be a disaster and the end of scourge)
    1. Or does everything remain as it was before, it's just that you forgot information (increase of the radius) on the line Sand savant?
    1. On the other hand, on "rework" if there is only one shade for the whole speSand Savant will always be taken in WvW so the other 2 strokes are still useless, because we're trying to hit as many targets as possible.in pvp Sand Savant will become useless, there are only 5 opponents!Have you thought about that?
    1. If we only have one only shade, do you think about looking at the 2 traits of the scourge Minor Master Sand Sage and Minor Grandmaster Blood as Sand?(Maybe do traits do something if you had an active shade and do something else if you don't?)
    1. Why do we have to break down barriers? because we will no longer put any barriers in fight for DPS scourges in WvW if we put a shade with your rework .

personally I understood:We only have one only shade of 180 radius that affects 5 peoples and 10 peoples if you have sand savant(maybe I'm stupid or just not English-speaking ^^)


Then I agree with you, it won't change the meta!Because there were nerfs but no up and rework required on the other classes/spe, nearby._ #Chrono, #Druide, #Tempest, #Revenant ventari for WvW supportsGuardian FB will always be the only viable support in WvW.

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Once again, as a mesmer player, I can only really comment significantly on those changes:

  • Illusion of Life change seems a reasonable balance, five seconds of invulnerability is way too much, however i'd suggest reducing to two seconds instead of just one.
  • Chaotic Interruption change is very exciting, I can't wait to see how that turns out in practice, but on the drawing board it still looks potentially gamechanging.
  • Mantra line of sight changes sound more like a bugfix than an actual change, however i've never had a mantra that didn't respect line of sight.
  • Mantras requiring you to be facing your target will likely end up as an annoyance more than an actual nerf, but personally I am quite disappointed about it.

My previous two posts in the other feedback threads elaborate more on my thoughts concerning the Chaotic Interruption and Mantra changes (which I believe have remained the same since the initial thread?) so I won't bore everybody to death by reiterating them here.

Thank you again for actually listening to our feedback, an effort like this is a very positive show amidst the recent sea of negativity.

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Scourge change looks really interesting to me. I believe it will change the gameplay. And the coverage issue is really on point!
I dont think increasing 10 cap is really a buff compared to the new shade mechanic.Dont know why people cry about the 10 target things.In zerg/blob fight, the space coverage is more important and it's the main factor that makes fight pirateship.

For FB, if you think your squad lack of stabs, just put extra fb in it."Sacrifice dmg to bring more sustainability" that's how the comp work. isnt it?You will never have 3 stacks of stab if EVERY FB use StYG. It's 10 targets so at least you should have around 6-9 stacks of it.

I personally like this change. Surely it might not be as good as i think but it's actually something.Maybe the meta shift abit, not in terms of squad comp but gameplay.I cant wait to see this change in the game.

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This is a terrible terrible idea for scourge. If you are insisting on doing this, then there must be a way to pull back a shade. Otherwise Scourge shades become useless to anything that moves, which is everything. And only do this change in pvp and wvw. Leave PvE alone!

With this change, honestly who would cast a shade anymore? You would hold your cleanse and barrier for yourself for your own emergency use and never risk casting a shade. The mechanic is now dead.

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The socrge update feels like it should of been done back in beta for the class. Having aoe at both the players feet and at ranged has comply destroyed the meta chose for classes. I hope we see thf and non tankly melee classes make a come back.

Superior Rune of Antitoxin update is needed but i think its going to hit some support classes more then others. Maybe make a out going condi clear only rune set that dose that only effect your out going clears to others but not your self. Or maybe a type of getting a very set boons from clears much like eng gets but far less "broken" in boon types.

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It won't make interesting game play it will just encourage you not to use shade at all.

Sand savant is the support trait so it should be support orientated. The 10 targets is fine but it needed to either do less damage or no damage or change manifest sand shade to do [insert supportive effects here ].

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Yea. This scourge change is in wrong direction. Why 10 targets?

This just means you won't be placing your shades down ever and run a melee ball. You can't afford of 15 seconds of the only anti-push class to lose their shade skills.Also it buffs sustain of the zerg massively up to a point where anyone that places a shade down is trolling. Giving barrier and cleansing 10 allies is worth more than placing the shade down, maybe if the shade lasted 5 seconds but it lasts 15 seconds and you can't remove it.... You can also combo the fear with corrupts and hit 10 targets with shroud melee range easier.This is just making scourge easier to play while punishing the people who lack knowledge. And Scourge being too easy was the problem, not it being too hard.

My suggestion:Make Sand Savant make every 3rd shade large shade and keep rest of them normal shades. Reduce the cooldown of Sand Savant shades in WvW by 10 seconds. This means cooldown on large shades will be average of 60 seconds, double from before. Increase the amount of shades allowed to 3, meaning they can have 1 large shade and 2 small shades up (4 additional targets than before) but they have to use all shades for that.

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I fear that these Necro changes will make anyone dislike Necro in pve again. And in wvw these changes seem like a little bit too much.

In pve:Especially healing Necro gets more and more accepted. And that's really good.But:Dmg scourge will take an huge hit on heavy movement bosses. And that's the only boss, where Necro is meta: soulless horror, a heavy movement boss.Also makes it more frustrating to play healing scourge. Cause dropping a shade for ranged "healing" on a single target isn't worth then.

Also the problem of scourge in wvw is the 10 the then target cap as well as ranged spam.With these changes, there will be even more ranged pressure, which everyone is asking to remove!Also with this change I don't think, that the barrier changes should go through. Cause now you won't be able to give barrier to allies around you, when you have a shade active.

This feels like a triple or quadruple nerf, without really noting the real problem.

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Ill just say this. If you are hell bent on keeping the proposed changes on scg now you need to add a insta cast remove shade button that reduces cd of manifest shade.

Damage was much greater than sustainin zergs and these changes are pushing it even further with 10target cap meanwhile forgetting that scg got f2-f3-f5 sustain for losing its shroud as hp. The said changes will bring another sense of "i casted a shade 14secs ago so now im facing the consequences of not being able to do anything and there is no way to escape from this. This sense of helplessness is now that i think about it a feature of necro which was missing from scg spec untill now but now they fixed it. Clap clap clap.

As for pve and pvp if these changes went live scg is ripperoni. Pve specifically cause this means you cant do damage from self if tank moved boss and you dont have f1 available which mind you scg needs 2 of em active at all times to get 100%condi duration so the chances are you wont have them available 90% of the time + the fact that the cds been increased many times since release. Rip necro rip scg.

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@Irenio CalmonHuang.2048 said:Necromancer

  • Scourge: Shade abilities only affect the area around you while you do not have a shade active in the world. This creates a choice of whether to be the focal point for your shade abilities by not summoning a shade or to place a shade at a distance and focus on your shade's positioning relying on distance as your safety. It also offers more distinct styles of gameplay where you may want to close with enemies and avoid having to place shades while being exposed in melee or placing a shade farther away to gain ranged offensive options at the risk of not having shade defensive benefits at your location (unless you place another shade beside you). To address the loss of some of the target cap, the number of targets affected by shade abilities will be increased from 3 to 5.

This is going to take some getting used to.

  • Manifest Sand Shade: The duration of sand shades in WvW & PvP has been increased from 10 seconds to 15 seconds.

Good Good.

  • Sand Savant: Increase the number of targets sand shade affect from 2 to 5, so that when traited you either affect up to 10 targets around you or have a single shade which affects up to 10 targets rather than the current incarnation where you've got a shade that affects 5 targets and you affect 5 targets near you.

I feel like Sand Savant should have its recharge increase part removed in order to help with the changes. Otherwise is going to be very limited on how often shades can be placed, and won't feel great to play. I do agree that you should have to choose where you want the aoe damage to be instead of it being on both user and target range, but with increased time on shades it's going to feel like trash. Especially with no way to unsummon a shade in order to use the abilities around your character instead. Otherwise us scourges will have to run over to our shade to do damage, which is not cool. Right now scourges rely on the shade placed away from them, and the aoe near them. This is why the increased shade timer worked for when it was at 2 different locations. Now that it's being limited to either range, or point blank aoe. Having a bit of relief with shorter recast shade charges would help with this. It should still have the limit 1 active shade, with the 5 target increase. Just not increased shade recharge.

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I agree like these shade changes will be a nerf to condi scourge for pve even though that wasn't the intent and it was aimed at scourge in wvw. While I do both, and I like the changes in WvW, in PvE its going to make our role much more difficult by having to place multiple shades (one on boss one on party) and there will be a time where we run out of shades on high movement bosses as it has been said before. Could it be possible to keep shades working the way they are now for PvE, or have a reduced shade recharge time in PvE only so to lessen the impact on scourges there?

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